Ancient Greek Philosophy - Aristotle

Question 1

what are the four causes

Answer 1

Material, efficient, formal and final

Question 2

What is the material cause?

Answer 2

the things out of which an object is created

Question 3

What is the efficient cause?

Answer 3

the agent that brings something into existence

Question 4

What is the formal cause?

Answer 4

the characteristics of an object which allow it to be identified

Question 5

what is the final cause?

Answer 5

the aim for which an object is created

Question 6

What were Aristotle’s key observations?

Answer 6

• Nothing comes from nothing
• The world exists in a process of change
• change occurs in two ways

Question 7

What is potentiality?

Answer 7

The possibility of something becoming something else

Question 8

What is actuality?

Answer 8

The fulfilment of a possibility in its fullest sense

Question 9

What is ‘nothing comes from nothing’ in Latin?

Answer 9

Ex nihilo nihil fit

Question 10

What was the word Aristotle used to mean cause?

Answer 10

Aition

Question 11

What is Aristotle’s cause for the universe?

Answer 11

The prime mover

Question 12

What cause is the prime mover?

Answer 12

final

Question 13

Aristotle’s view on infinity

Answer 13

He postulated the impossibility if infinity suggesting there is a final cause to all causes: the prime mover.

Question 14

What is the prime mover?

Answer 14

A transcendent necessary being that is unmoved and has not been acted upon against any other agent. It is unaware of its existence and only contemplates itself.

Question 15

An example of how things attract things without moving themselves

Answer 15

A moth to a flame
The flame doesn’t physically move the moth but it is attracted to the flame and moves itself.

Question 16

How does moth analogy relate to the prime mover?

Answer 16

The prime mover like the moth doesn’t move but us contingent beings gravitate to it and are caused to move by the prime mover without any personal involvement.

Question 17

Is the prime mover aware of the motion it causes

Answer 17

No

Question 18

The prime mover is pure ….

Answer 18

Actuality

Question 19

What is pure actuality?

Answer 19

It has no telos ability to become something else

Question 20

Strengths of the prime mover

Answer 20

• Satisfactory explanation for evil – has no claims to be omnibenevolent so has no responsibility to stop it, it is unaware of evil.
• Some evidence for necessary beings- energy
• anscombe - magician quote

Question 21

Weaknesses of the prime mover

Answer 21

• Illogical leap to assumes because we have a cause the universe has a cause – fallacy of composition - bertrand russel
• No sufficient evidence - hume
• Aristotle is suffering an existential crisis – trying to find meaning where there isn’t any
• He dismisses the possibility for infinity – numbers, we have no reason to believe infinity does or doesn’t exist so shouldn’t base our theory on it
• fallacy of affirming the concequent

Question 22

Flaws of the concept that everything has a cause

Answer 22

• Quantum physics and atomic decay suggests there are uncaused things
• Flaw within the formal causes – if a human is missing a leg (a predicate for humans) that doesn’t make them any less human

Question 23

Strengths of the concept that everything has a cause

Answer 23

• He used inductive reasoning, we can observe things have causes
• Anscombe quote
• natural theologians use the idea that the world has a point of contact with God that means we can understand him - aritotole does soething similar

Question 24

Strengths on empiricism and essential ideas of theory

Answer 24

• Uses modern thinking as society becomes more secular observation-based knowledge is favoured especially in science
• We can observe material things having a cause – chair

Question 25

weaknesses on empiricism and essential ideas of theory

Answer 25

• Plato allegory of the cave
• Descartes – if we a put a stick in water it appears bent showing senses can’t be trusted
• Arrogant to assume humans have the intelligence to observe everything and understand it.

Question 26

what are the processes of change?

Answer 26

potentiality and actuality

Question 27

how did Aristotle define change?

Answer 27

potentiallity and actuality

Question 28

what is aristotles use of teleology?

Answer 28

telos = purpose

everything has a purpose in the world - this its it final cause
the prime mover is the telos of the world

Question 29

what is teleology?

Answer 29

the explanation of phenomena in terms of the purpose they serve

Question 30

how did motion lead to the prime mover?

Answer 30

• aristotle had a geocentric world view
• stars etc move around the earth
• yet motion requires a cause and how do things continue to move because this motion slow down
• there cannot be a regression otherwise motion wouldnt have began
• so must be a prime mover

Question 31

why can prime mover not be matter

Answer 31

because matter changes and they are pure actuality

Question 32

what is the soul?

Answer 32

soul is the formal cause of the body

Question 33

for aristotle how do we go from cause to effect?

Answer 33

there are a process of 4 causes

effect / actuality only occures if these 4 conditions are met

for example, a seed only grows into its potential of a tree if it has water and sunlight etc

Question 34

criticism about purpose

Answer 34

francis bacon -> rejects telos regarding it a metaphysical issue, modern science can explain change without an apparent sense of purpore

dawkins - no evidence of telos

sartre - rejects telos, existence proceeds essence, fabricated notion of telos due to fear

Question 35

newton

Answer 35

Newton’s rejection of Aristotle’s basis for the prime mover
Newton proved that Aristotle was wrong to think that motion runs out. Actually, motion (kinetic energy) just transfers into another type of energy.
If you throw a ball in outer space it will just continue moving potentially forever.
So, the stars/planets don’t need some special explanation like a prime mover to explain why they continue to move.